HTC brings Beats Audio to all Sense 4.0 devices

One of HTC's major (if questionable) maneuvers of 2011 was the purchase of Beats Audio. With the reportedly $300 million deal came better earbuds for a few phones released late in the year, as well as some on-board audio enhancements.

But from a software standpoint, the Beats improvements were fairly sandboxed. HTC's apps could play with Beats, but not much else.

That chances with Sense 4.0.

The Beats software has been rearranged in the audio stack so that all applications on a Sense 4.0 smartphone can take take advantage of the feature. That means just about any application you download -- any third-party music player, any third-party video player, any game -- use the Beats Audio enhancements in an HTC device.

Will you notice an improvement in, say, Google Music? Or Pandora? Maybe. Or maybe not. But the point is that with the upcoming HTC devices that were just announced this evening, you'll have the opportunity to find out.

A colleague tells me that ICS will only work with HTC Sense 4.0, so those of us slated for an ICS upgrade to our current HTC handsets (Sensation, Amaze, Evo, et al) will get Sense 4.0? Phil (or Jerry), can you update us on that while you're there?

I'll be trying to decide this spring if I ditch my new Amaze for a One S or One X, or seeing if HTC's ICS update brings fixes and new functionality to my (until today) top-of-the-line T-Mo phone.... TIA.